


No Heroes In This Place

by Inter_VersaLoli



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon), 明日方舟 | Arknights (Video Game)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Crossover, Gen, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-14 03:56:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28789086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inter_VersaLoli/pseuds/Inter_VersaLoli
Summary: Thrust into the unforgiving world of Terra, there can only be two possible outcomes for the young heroes of Young Justice: Make Terra a better place, or break utterly.
Kudos: 9





	1. A Broken City

"Guys, how the hell did we end up in _Russia?_ " Kid Flash exclaimed, as he looked around the foreign cityscape.

At the very least, it _looked_ Russian.

The street signs and storefronts were clearly in Russian (Robin could read the language), and the abandoned, overturned cars littering the street resembled Ladas and other vehicles of the old Soviet bloc. Almost everything else was a misshapen pile of steel and rubble.

The last few minutes were a blur to the team.

One moment, they were infiltrating yet another one of those lavishly-funded, secret underground laboratories that seemed all the rage these days, the next moment they were flung through some weird portal-thing before they even had the chance to gather some evidence. Robin was literally in the middle of downloading sensitive information from one of their servers, when some goon threw a strange device into the room and locked the door.

The next moment, they were falling wildly through time and space. Just to cap things off, Robin's data was corrupted.

That's what stung most at the moment. Their hearts twisted more for the failure of their mission than their current predicament.

A morsel of information Robin gleaned from the data stream, before the interruption, was that this lab had been corresponding closely with LexCorp for the last few months. Great, so this was probably yet another one of that bald man's schemes, not that the Team would be in any position to warn Superman about it.

"What the _hell,_ man!? We were _so_ close, like, _this_ close to catching the guy." Kid Flash complained, holding his thumb and pointer finger a fraction of an inch apart.

"Flash, there is no point in worrying over what might have been. Let us focus on analyzing our new situation, and decide on a course of action from there." said Aqualad, ever the stoic leader.

"Whatever you say, boss."

The streets they were in seemed deserted. And no surprise, considering that the city seemed to have recently gone through hell.

It wasn't just a few buildings looted and burned down, nor a few cars turned over in the street. The buildings looked like they were pounded with a giant hammer, until their rubble turned to paste. The streets weren't just cracked, they were turned inside-out, dark asphalt visible under piles of aggregate and topsoil. The street lamps were bent at extreme angles, and it seemed that everything that _could_ be on fire, was on fire.

"It looked like an earthquake passed through here…". said Ms. Martian, surveying the scene from above.

"No. _People_ did this." Robin said, walking over to an overturned, burnt-out husk of a truck. "Very _angry_ people, at that."

"Such destruction happening is unfortunate, but it is not currently our responsibility unless we happen upon innocent people in danger." said Aqualad, stepping forward. "We should focus on re-establishing contact with Red Tornado or Batman as soon as possible-"

Suddenly, they heard a scream.

Running to the source, they saw a group of masked assailants cornering a young couple. Oddly enough, both the attackers and the victims seemed to have what looked like bear ears stuck on top of their heads.

Shaking his head, Connor yelled. "Hey _assholes._ Pick on someone your own size!"

The thugs turned around. One of them raised an eyebrow at the team's appearance.

"Who the hell are you people supposed to be?"

"Escapees from the circus, it looks like." said the one beside him.

"They don't look like locals to me." said another.

" _Ah,_ who the hell cares. It's more meat for the meat grinder." said the first one, reaching into his scabbard and drawing a wicked looking sword.

"It doesn't have to end in violence." Aqualad said, approaching them with his hands held outwards. "If you could willingly surrender yourselves and allow us to call the authorities-"

It was at that point that the thugs laughed in his face.

"We of Reunion just made the police and fucking _army_ look like idiots. Just look around you! Where the fuck would you find a police officer, kid?"

"Even if you did, they'd be too busy holding off our main contingents to even give you circus freaks the time of day!"

All at once: Robin, Superboy, and Kid Flash's eyebrows _twitched._

"We're _not_ from the circus!" they shouted.

"Well you sure do _talk_ like clowns!" said one of them. "Do you even know _who_ we are!? What we're going to do to you?"

"I know that you people are trying to provoke a fight with us for seemingly no reason." said Aqualad. "Relax. We are newcomers to this place, and would like to know what has happened here, that is all..."

"..."

"... Excuse me?"

"So that's it, huh? A buncha outsiders sticking their nose in where they don't belong. Well, if it hasn't been obvious enough for you smoothbrains: We, _Reunion,_ have taken over this city!"

"... Huh? Boss, they're gone!"

"What?"

The masked man in front turned around, to see that the overfed bastards they'd cornered had long since snuck off.

Had escaped _justice._

The masked men clenched their fists, and turned back towards the Team.

"You uninfected folk think you can stomp _all over_ us, thinking that by stepping hard enough, we'll disappear? Well, _fuck no,_ we ain't interested in disappearing! We'll remind you that we Infected _exist_ whether you fucking want to or not! No matter how much 'chaos' we cause, it's still no match for all the oppression you put us through-"

"Infected? Infected with _what?_ " asked Kid Flash, somewhat flippantly.

That was precisely the _wrong_ thing to say.

" _Kill them!_ "

With a collective cry, the masked men rushed the team.

Aqualad made the first counter-move, spraying the road between him and the charging thugs, causing them to fall and trip over each other. Artemis then launched an arrow that split into an electrified net, shocking them into unconsciousness.

Robin, meanwhile, was being mobbed three-to-one. He dodged a descending club, then a charging fist, before barely sidestepping a swung sword. He winced as his forehead stung, and blood spilled into his eyes. He jumped away from the melee, rubbing under his mask.

"Ah, shit! Guys! These aren't some rent-a-minions we're dealing with here! Be careful!"

The thugs fought like men and women possessed, completely uncaring of their injuries, of how much pain they must be feeling. They didn't seem to have any self-preservation at all, only a burning desire to kill and maim their enemies.

Near the back of the group, a duo of ominous figures in grey cloaks were keeping their distance. Suddenly, they raised their hands into the air, their palms glowing with a strange light.

"Guys, _sorcery,_ look out!" M'gann yelled, flying towards the casters with her arms raised.

In an instant, she lifted the casters into the air, an invisible force holding their arms tightly against their backs.

And that's how they handled the rest of the fight. Though they fought fiercely, the Team made it an utmost priority to avoid killing. Anything less would bring shame to their illustrious mentors.

Their enemies were unexpectedly tough, but the Team eventually knocked them all out.

As they tied up the thugs, the adrenaline seeped from them. Wally yelped and fell to a knee, clutching his left arm.

It was a wound sustained as he was running towards a crossbowman firing in his direction, causing the bolt to graze his arm at nearly the speed of sound.

" _Ow!_ The hell were those guys!" he exclaimed.

"Who knows? Just a bunch of opportunistic looters, most likely. People taking advantage of the chaos to do things they'd never dare otherwise." said Artemis.

"I don't think very many looters would have swordsmen or _magic-users_ in their midst. Something _weird_ is going on around here…" said Robin.

"Robin is correct. This is clearly not normal. We will need to keep on our toes." said Aqualad.

***

As they continued wandering the city, Aqualad turned to Robin. There was a bandage around his forehead now, like a snow-white bandana with a red centre.

"Any luck with communications?"

The Boy Wonder swore as his device flashed red with yet another error message.

"I'm not _getting_ to them. What about you, Aqualad?"

"Same here." said Aqualad, holding up his copy of the communicator, his right as team leader.

Miss Martian closed her eyes and attempted to reach out with telepathic feelers, only to open her eyes again in disappointment.

"I couldn't feel Uncle Jon's presence _anywhere_ on this planet. And his psychic signature is usually so distinctive!" she complained.

"Well, there could be any possible number of reasons for that." said Robin. "For example: Perhaps there's way too much background noise?"

" _She's_ the one with the psychic powers, not you, birdbrain." said Conner, watching the rear.

" _Hey, Hey,_ it's all cool. Let's all be _whelmed,_ people. Remember: Let's all remember to get _whelmed._ "

"Yeah, alright, I'm all for being _whelmed,_ whatever the fuck that even means. But what do we actually do _now!?_ Unless you boys want to keep slinging around made-up words until the sun sets." said Artemis.

"Err… We keep walking 'round until we find a police officer, or _someone_ like that _._ They did say they were busy around here _holding off the main contingents,_ whatever that means...." Robin opined.

"So we're just _winging it_ now?" Artemis said.

"Hey, we've been" winging it" since Day 1." said Superboy. "I don't see what's so problematic about it."

"... Point taken."

After a few more minutes' worth of walking, Robin and Kid Flash, scouting ahead, spotted two thugs up ahead with their backs turned.

"Ah geez, we don't really have time to waste on even more ruffians…" said Robin. "So we're all going into this sneaky-beaky-like. Flash?"

"Ya got it, boss." Wally said, pulling down his goggles.

For a moment, he blinked, before moving at speeds faster than a human brain can properly process. He can't keep this sort of speed up for any length of time, not like his mentor, but he _could_ do it for a paltry second, enough to knock a pair of goons unconscious before their brains had even finished registering the sensation of his hand grabbing the side of their heads. He would've also given them terrible wedgies, if not for Aqualad disapproving of such unprofessional behaviour.

As Robin was tying them up, the rest of the team looked at the building they were overseeing.

It was a large, blocky complex. Ruined, cracked, yet not yet destroyed. Several parts of it looked like makeshift repairs were done by inexperienced hands. The whole place gave off a desolate feel.

"Is that… a school?"

"Looks like it."

"Were those dudes guarding the place or something? What the hell's in there?"

"What… or _Who?_ " Aqualad said, stepping forward. "If that place really is a school, then there must be trapped civilians inside. Students and teachers." he said, and the rest of the team's expressions hardened.

***

"How are you holding up, Anna?" asked "General Zima", real name Sonia, feared bully-hunter among the local studentry, in a surprisingly tender voice.

"... Fine. I'm absolutely fine, Sonya. You should know as well as I that quietness is no sign of ill health."

"No, but breathing like you're constantly about to drown isn't."

"..."

"If you keep it all bottled up inside, you're gonna explode and start punching things. _Not_ that that's a bad hobby to have, but I'm kinda afraid you might faint after bruising your hand or something."

"I'm very touched by your concern, Sonia."

"..."

After a moment, Sonya leaned in closer to Anna.

" _Hey,_ no need to worry your ass over all this. Just leave all the heavy duty fighting to me." she proudly said.

Anna blinked.

"Don't worry…?" the blunette muttered.

"Hm? Anna, you say something?"

"You said _don't worry._ And I don't doubt you're strong enough to protect the four of us when things get nasty. But even after this crisis ends, I don't think we can just laugh it off and return to our normal, everyday lives like it never happened…"

"Why the hell not?"

"... Sonya, your 'normal daily life' includes you getting into several bloody fistfights a day. I don't think you're a good representative of the average student body…"

" _Hey,_ don't think this is a whole different thing from life before. The students around here were always keen to use their fists over words, and the noble kids always saw us as trash while their mommies and daddies were sucking the blood of us lower classes for a _long_ time.

It's just that now, with those Reunion assholes thrashing the infrastructure and the _noble_ police and army being too distracted with saving their rich donors' property to send _us_ any help, the noble kids are now in a situation where they can't make people do whatever they want just by throwing money at them. So instead, they try to kill us. They're _scum._ "

Anna said nothing. Sonia looked out of the hallway. A few minutes ago, it was completely empty.

Now...

Zima slammed the classroom door shut. The sounds of a rusty lock rotating put everyone inside on edge.

"Sonia?"

"Eyes off the book, Anna. Those fuckers are back."

***

The team stepped into the school, and found it to be just as dilapidated as the exterior.

" _Man,_ I know school's hell, but…"

Wally didn't have time to finish that thought, because up ahead, the team heard a cluster of shouts and screams up ahead. Shouts of triumph and distress both.

Very _young_ voices, at that.

***

"Aah!"

" _Aargh!_ "

Blood sprayed in a graceful arc, painting a perfect half-circle on the hallway's tiled floor. The other three would-be raiders, splashed with the blood of their newly dead comrade, swore and backed away from the crazy Ursus-shaped killing machine before them.

"Come on!" Zima yelled, baring her teeth. "Am I fighting _babies!?_ "

Behind her, Anna was beginning to cast the first syllables of a combat spell, while Leto readied her fists.

With a thunderous cry, the students rushed each other with immense ferocity, motivated by fear for their safety on one side, and bitter, ravenous hunger on the other. They wielded whatever deadly item (or item that can be _made_ deadly) was at hand: knives, forks, pencils, pieces of concrete, rebar, rocks, crowbars, axes, even fists.

And then the wall beside them blew up, and Zima and another student she was about to behead had their arms seized by a yellow blur.

"Hey _whoah, whoah, whoah,_ hold the phone here people! What the grill's going on here? What in the world is _wrong_ with you people!?" Kid Flash said.

At that moment, students on both sides stared incredulously at this newcomer. He wore a completely ridiculous outfit, a skintight costume dyed in bright yellow and red. All in all, he looked like he just got kicked out of the circus.

The rest of the bear children(?) turned towards them, shocked at first, and then furious.

"Who the _hell_ are you people!? What do you want? Are you with Reunion? Are you gonna try and steal our food too!?" asked a noble girl, showing a look of pure hate on a face much too young for it.

"What, _no!_ We're doing no such thing!" answered, raising his arms as if in feeble surrender. "We just wanted you to stop the fighting! C'mon, you're classmates, aren't you? Can't you, like, _share_ or something?"

" _Classmates!?_ Of these lower-class churls?" said a plump boy standing just beside the hate-faced girl. "We don't even know where this _is,_ those thugs just dragged us out of our school and shoved us into this fetid excuse for one!"

"What the hell is with those getups, anyway? Did the circus get caught up in this Catastrophe too?" Zima quipped.

Both Kid Flash and Robin twitched their brows Eyebrows.

"No, we're not circus performers…" Aqualad said, ignoring their derision. "We're _heroes._ And it doesn't matter who we are, who _you_ are, or where. It's our duty to protect people from harm."

Zima's expression turned nasty. "Well where the _hell_ were you then, when the riots started!? Where were you when the city turned to hell and we had to _kill_ just to _eat!?_ "

"H-Hey, _calm down,_ will ya?"

" I am _not_ calming down! It's because of you _useless_ fucking adults that we students are even _in_ this mess to begin with!"

" _Umm,_ we're _teenagers,_ just like you girls…"

Everyone's eyes were on the girl with the axe now, as she spat her disgust at these newly-arrived "heroes".

As they argued, one of the blue bloods snuck up on Wally as his back was turned, grasping something very hard and sharp in his hand.

As the verbal exchange grew louder, the children on both sides were beginning to grow restless, and the Team tensed up...

Suddenly, there was a loud yelp.

Everyone in the hallway looked at Kid Flash, as he laid on the floor, bleeding.

***

As she was ranting at him, Wally imagined the million-and-one ways he could think of to incapacitate her before she even knew what was happening: trip her up, tie her legs, slap tape over her mouth, run circles around her so quickly that she gets trapped in a temporary vacuum…

"We're just here to help!" said Wally as he raised his palms, trying to peacefully placate the girl waving an axe the size of her torso.

Robin stepped forward. "My friend's got a point. Let's all _put down_ the weapons _,_ get _whelmed,_ and try to think through our situation in a calm and collected way _together_."

But _damn it_ , Heroes have standards.

_-!!!!!_

_Pain. Shoulder._

" _Ow!_ What the-"

Wally craned his neck, and looked at his shoulder.

It was a terrible wound. An attacker had stabbed him with a piece of grayish crystal.

"Wha…-"

He felt the pain. He fell to the floor.

"Wally!" yelled Artemis.

" _Petrov!_ What the _fuck_ did you do to him!?" someone yelled.

The newly identified Petrov backed away and spat. "Clown bastard had what was coming to him. And _you fuckers_ are _next,_ you hear! I'm going to make sure you're all _dead_ for your insolence or my father is not the great General of the 4th Army! Did you hear that!? You _should!_ That means my father is going to hunt down every single one of you ungrateful wretches, and _hang_ you for treasonously acting against us nobles! Don't you dare forget, because my parents certainly won't!"

"Your precious dad is fucking _dead,_ Illyvich, better get over it as soon as possible!" said Zima.

At that point, the noble students decided to flee, rather than having to deal with this awkward situation. The rest gathered around Wally.

The blue-haired girl kneeled beside him, and waved a hand. Artemis pointed an arrow at her, to which Zima raised her axe at the archer.

" _Relax,_ I'm just going to use Arts to check over your comrade's condition." said Anna.

Artemis slowly lowered her bow.

"Wait, since when did you know Medical Arts, Anna?" asked Sonia/Zima.

"Learned it from a book on First Aid, when we barricaded ourselves in that library. Remember?" she replied.

She hovered her right hand, glowing with mystic light, over Kid Flash's grievously injured shoulders.

"Well, like Sonia said, I'm no medic, but can at least tell you that your comrade isn't in danger of dying anytime soon…"

She solemnly looked at the crystal embedded in the boy's shoulder, a gaze which the others followed.

"... We should take him to a real doctor as soon as possible, though."

"Agreed."

***

Meanwhile, under Wally's skin, flakes of the strange crystal began to enter his bloodstream, while the muscles next to the wound slowly began to crystallize...


	2. Strangers in a Strange Land

The best one could say about the classroom they were holing up in, was that it was quiet. When they weren't eating or preparing to defend themselves, they had a lot of downtime. The students spent most of it staring into space, daydreaming of better times. Others had hushed, desperate conversations in the room's four corners.

The students who helped them, who didn't run away, had quietly led them down the hallways, through twists and turns, into a barricaded part of the school. The Team saw some more students there.

And so for a while now they've stayed there, nursing Wally's wounds, with the axe-wielding girl's tacit permission.

Wally, for his part, sat against the wall, groaning.

" _Aww man,_ getting injured twice in a row like that, is going to _totally ruin_ my _hero rep,_ man…" he complained, as Ms. Martian wrapped his arm in a cast.

" _Wally,_ nobody's going to begrudge you just because you got injured on the job." replied the Martian girl.

"In fact, I know quite a few people for whom that would be a turn-on." quipped Artemis.

"Plus, nobody's gonna hear of your exploits anyway, what with us being a highly confidential team and all." Robin said, kneeling next to him. " _KF,_ your arm's feeling okay?"

"... Yeah. But I'm definitely not going back into the fight again anytime soon, huh?"

"As of now, you're utmost duty is to heal well, so you may rejoin us as strong as you ever were…" said Aqualad, smiling. "For now, let the rest of us carry the load."

"Your words fill me with great Determination, oh dear leader, I will certainly cherish them for the rest of my life." Wally half-jokingly said, before going quiet.

He turned his head at the grey crystal, still embedded in his shoulder.

"..."

The Team were debating whether to pull out the foreign object, but ultimately decided against it. If he didn't bleed out first, he would almost certainly get infected. This school had quite a few useful scavengable objects, but disinfectants were no longer one of them.

So, they had to leave it there, like a gaping tumour that was growing out of his flesh.

" _Great Sar'Vosh the Sorceror,_ I didn't sign up for this…" said M'gann, holding a hand to her forehead.

"You didn't expect that people would get _hurt_ during our missions?" Artemis said.

"What? _No,_ I'm not some naive little girl!" M'gann said in frustration. "But even in those days, where things got _really_ bad, at least we still had a home base to retreat to. At least we could ask for help from our mentors, the Justice League, or even civilians! But I think this is the first time where… where..."

"Where there's no place to retreat to." Kal'dur replied. "We are in a strange place now, and enemies surround us like silt in a muddy river."

"I've been in a few undercover missions." said Robin. "I know the feeling."

Artemis stayed silent.

Meanwhile, Wally fell asleep, still groaning.

"..."

They had to bring him to a Doctor, and they had to bring him _now._

***

The noble kids went away, but predictably, not for long.

Zima and Robin were walking through the former school canteen, hoping to search the kitchen for any remaining cans that somehow remained untouched. Not likely, they knew.

Then, from behind overturned tables came a gaggle of fancily-dressed Ursus children, their fine clothes caked with layers of dirt and grime, their once-immaculately coiffed hair now hanging in deranged strips around their heads.

They rushed the two of them.

Zima growled. Robin stoically pulled out his two _escrima_ sticks.

They fought.

They fought like hell, like the world would end if they failed there and then.

Zima was a rampaging berserker, with an axe nearly as tall as she. It was well-worn, far too well worn for someone as young as her.

She lashed out in rage, barely directing it to strike only at her foes. Their flesh and bones split apart as if under a butcher's knife. The people of Ursus may have prodigious strength, but their flesh was no more durable than any other Terran. By the end, her attackers were chunks of meat and fabric, lying in fresh pools of blood.

Robin, trained in formal martial arts, was more graceful in his movements, yet no less fierce.

He moved with precision, dodging and deflecting attacks until his calculating eyes found the slightest opening, the rarest moment of tactical weakness. Then, he struck out with the force of a charging bull, straight into their guts, their legs, their faces.

He counted himself lucky that none of them had guns.

When the battle was over, the two of them looked over their handiwork. Zima looked at Robin's opponents, and snorted. Of course, all the enemies he engaged were merely knocked out, not dead. She could even hear some of them snoring.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing, bird-boy?"

What am I doing? I'm _helping_ to defend you and friends! You should be grateful, you know!" he said, throwing his arms up in the air. "I'm not stupid. I could smell your rotten attitude from a mile away."

The Ursus girl walked up to him, and stared him down.

"... What's your problem?" he asked.

"... My problem? The fact that you handle these _murderers_ with _oven mitts!_ Yes, it's very sad that some of them have to die, but it's their own _damn_ fault for attacking us first! Do you know what you're actually doing, circus freak? You're sending them a message that it's _okay_ for them to keep trying to kill us all, because you'll let them off with nothing more than a bad headache the next day. Do you know what will fucking happen _next?_ They'll just come _again_ and _again_ and _fucking again,_ since they know there'll be _no cost_ to messing with us!"

" _Oh?_ And did those kids _ever_ stop attacking you, even after you killed their friends? _No,_ because they're hungry and desperate and want to survive, _just like you._ You just don't want to admit that you and them are in the same boat."

He casually leaned against one of the long tables that dotted what used to be the school canteen.

"Did you say all those things because you actually _believed_ in them? Or did you just want to justify taking the lives of all your peers after the fact?" he pressed.

She snarled.

"Every life is precious. Even the ones that you don't think deserve to keep living. That's what my mentor taught me, and it was the most important lesson of them all." Robin enunciated, and Zima's urge to punch this stranger in the face was never stronger.

"They were _not_ my peers, you fucking cosplayer, and you and your mentor are pompous _assholes_ who believe in their own invented ideals more than actually _helping_ people! You don't have the _guts_ to accept the reality of improving the world, which will always involve _some_ bloodshed!"

She trudged towards him until their noses were very nearly touching.

" _Face it_ , you can't save everyone! Most of the time, you'll have _no choice_ but to to pick and _choose_ who to help, and who to leave. And I, for one, would much rather save my energy to help those people who fucking _deserve_ my help, and leave the rest to deal with their own shit."

With that, she walked away.

***

The Ursus Self-Governing group was roughly more than a dozen strong, enough to fill half a classroom. Zima (real name Sonia) and Gummy (real name Lada) were their most notable members. The former was their tough-but-fair leader, while the latter was the only student in the entire group who knew how to cook. However, it was their total numbers that allowed them to withstand constant assaults from other groups of starving students.

Then one day, a few strangers moved in with them.

They were a few years older than the rest of them, dressed strangely, and who were definitely not students. They probably weren't locals, either. In most of their eyes, that was enough to avoid them like the Infected.

The only ones who bothered to speak to them were Zima, and their designated chef. The former seemed to keep those strangers on a leash, at least. For the latter, it was because one of the strangers had offered to help with the cooking. The rest were anxious about that, of course. What if they decided to poison them? What if they were bad news from the very beginning!?

At least with Zima around, they couldn't do very much without getting killed for it.

***

Anna and Sonia brought in some new people today. They weren't students, though they were teenagers, like us. Actually they were a few years older. They also weren't wearing uniforms, just these really colourful outfits!

Are they from the circus?

Ah well, Gummy thought, it didn't matter. The more friends, the merrier, right?

But…

_How are we going to get enough food for us all?_

Gummy was already worried when the food pantries in their part of the school began to thin out. They had to eat less and less each day to compensate. Gummy could see the effects on her friends. They grew thinner, and more temperamental. They got into loud arguments more often. She could hear their stomachs growl, even after mealtime.

It broke her heart to see them like this. She couldn't bear it if someone starved to death under her watch. Her schoolmates called her _Gum_ because she always knew what to do with food. She could take snack foods, or takeout leftover, or some unused ingredients from Home Econ class, and turn them into something new and delicious. She was like a one-woman department store cafe!

But now there was barely anything left. The kitchen freezers have long been emptied, and now all that was left with them were a tiny handful of canned goods.

What could she do now, with so little?

...

But maybe…

What if...

After several days like this, she finally made the hard, _hard_ decision to procure new meat from… _unconventional_ sources.

After all, many students had already fallen. And though she knows a proper burial would be far more civilized… they _really_ needed to eat.

If they were looking down from heaven now, she was sure they'd be alright with helping other kids like them live on, right?

_Right?_

_RIght?_

Gummy was sad that they finally had to resort to it, but Gummy was even sadder that she almost hurt one of her friends before this! All because she was so hungry!

Stupid Gummy. Pathetic Gummy.

It's such a good thing she had a helper in the "kitchen" now! A nice Savra girl a few years older than her! Gummy was pretty sure she was some sort of Chameleon Savra, since she could change her shape in all sorts of amazing ways. But when she asked about it, the other girl just laughed nervously.

She and the Savra girl were now at the "kitchen counter" (actually a bunch of cabinets joined together at one wall of the room). She was rather uneasy when looking at the harvested meat, so Gummy offered to chop those, while the Savra girl focused on the vegetables.

Hefting her knife, Gummy looked down at the meat.

pork meat

chicken meat

bear meat

From a certain point of view, what could possibly be the difference now? They're all meat. You can cook any of them over an open flame.

At this point, they should get what they _can_ get.

They were preparing lunch. Gummy had better make sure it was special, because they only ever ate lunch these days

As she and the Savra girl ( _Megan,_ Gummy reminded herself) sliced the ingredients, she heard a loud sob from beside her.

"I'm sorry… I'm so, so sorry… Nobody your age should go what you just went through…" said Megan.

"... Why are you saying sorry?" said Gummy, giving her the brightest smile in the whole wide world. "You didn't do anything wrong."

***

The streets of Chernobog were less intense now than they were just a few days ago, during the retrieval operation. The central government seemed to have given up on this city. The only pockets of fighting left were at the very edges, or inside isolated districts. Whatever remained of the police and the military units in this city, were making their respective last stands.

"Ms. Blaze, our teams _just_ got out of this godforsaken city! The hell were they thinking, sending us right inside again? I thought we already got what we wanted outta this place?" complained one Operator, watching her group's back

"Didn't you hear the briefing? Apparently, they picked up some weird Arts readings from somewhere in the city limits. Plus, we hadn't been in action for some time, so I guess they took the opportunity to see if we were still worth shit _._ " joked another.

Their designated leader for this mission was near the front: A Feline woman with the build of an amazonian, and a chainsaw strapped to her back. She looked back at the Operators they gave her for this mission, and frowned.

"I'm no scientist, so I don't know shit about this "exotic energy" or stuff like it, but Doctor Kal'tsit said it was _very important!_ " said Operator Blaze. "And Doc K's word goes. Whatever we're doing, it's for the good of the Infected. Also, all of us are getting hazard pay for this. If ya didn't want to risk your life out here, you shouldn't have bothered crawling out of Logistics!" she shouted to those stragglers at the back. She then turned around to keep track of the Operator who was supposed to be taking point, only to find her missing.

"... Skadi? Skadi, where'd you go? … Hey _Skadi,_ what are you _doing!?_ "

The figure she spotted in the distance calmly ignored her. Instead, she walked through a row of buildings in front of her, all the while dismissing the rain of arrows and bolts raining down on her.

There were shrill screams of terror as the buildings collapsed, leaving a dusty Skadi standing in the middle of the rubble.

"... Ah- _choo!_ " the Aegir sneezed.

"... Wow… and I thought the stories about her were far fetched…"

"No, they're all true. Every single word of it."

"... Is this why a lot of people don't like her?"

***

" _Meal's ready!_ "

The cheery Ursus girl went to each member of the Self-Governing Group, and gave them a small plate each. Each plate contained precisely one meat patty, and a smattering of lettuce.

Artemis and Wally, their stomachs rumbling, gladly dug in, while the rest regarded the food warily.

Robin took an experimental bite of the meat.

"..."

Suddenly, Robin felt a wave of nausea pass over him.

Looking at his little plate, Robin settled for placing it on top of the shelf next to him, the remaining contents uneaten.

"Rob? What the matter?" asked Artemis, as she was halfway through the meat patty. "Hmm… Kinda tastes like pork."

"Hey Rob, if you're not gonna eat that, can I have that for seconds?" asked Wally.

Robin kept silent for a moment, as if having an intense debate with himself. Finally, he pursed his mouth and turned to the rest of the room.

"We _can't_ stay here." Robin said.

"Aww…" said Gummy. "He doesn't like my food…"

After looking at Gummy, Zima glared daggers into the "heroes". "You're really fucking idiot _cykas_ , aren't you? Where the _hell_ would we all even go!?. The entire _city's_ been taken over by those maniacs! Hell, maybe even the entire _landship!_ And even if we _do_ get off the ship, we still have _fucking kilometres_ of wretched snowy wasteland to trek through. At least here, we can guarantee to sleep for another day so long as we lock all our doors, and have _somebody_ on night watch." she said.

"Err… what's a landship?" asked Wally.

"But is staying here _really_ the better course of action, Zima?" asked Anna. "You know how they broke those locks a few days ago. The nobles are getting more and more desperate. They're hanging on a thread of food, Zima, just like we are."

Zima looked away.

"Pretty soon, no matter what… new sources of food we find, it's still not going to be enough. We are all going to run out of food, sooner or later. Leaving this place may soon be our only option."

Zima snarled, but said nothing.

***

As the sun dipped below the ruined buildings, and darkness fell, the school around them somehow became even more foreboding.

...

A few hours later, Robin's voice rang through The Team's heads.

_Guys. Team powwow,_ now. _In classroom 3C._

***

The Team huddled together in one corner of the abandoned classroom, perched upon scavenged chairs.

" _Alright guys,_ one thing's become very clear to me: We need to leave here _ASAP._ Else, we're almost certainly going to _die_ here." said Artemis. "With no backup, no contacts, no resources and no home base to return to, we'll either starve to death first, or get shanked in our sleep. Just telling it how it is, people."

"... But we can't just _abandon_ them!" M'gann shot back.

"Maybe we can bring them along with us?" Robin offered.

"... Excuse me if you think I'm being insensitive, but I have to wonder what's the big deal?" said Wally. "I mean, _yeah_ it's harsh, but they're all doing surprisingly okay with themselves so far. If they can still feed everyone hamburgers, then they're definitely not short on food supplies. Why can't we just hang in here until the authorities arrive?"

"… Dude, first off, did you _see_ the state the city was in? Secondly, just earlier, they gave us _human flesh patties_ for _lunch._ "

At that phrase, everyone grew deathly silent.

"... _Hahaha,_ that's funny Rob. Alright, tell me what _really_ happened." Wally said, with far too much good cheer. "Those were definitely some pork patties they took from the school freezer or something, my tastebuds _never lie_ when it comes to food! I'm the five-time eating champion at my local Happy Burger!"

Robin just stared at him.

"... Oh God, you're serious, aren't you?"

Nods.

"..."

For a long time, the rest of the Team was dead silent, their faces taking on unreadable expressions.

"... _Oh Gods,_ how am I gonna tell my old man that I _ate people._ " Wally exclaimed, putting his face in his hands. Meanwhile, everyone else turned a little bit green.

" _Yeaaah…_ I decided to tell you this only now and not immediately after dinner, 'cause I didn't want you guys to start throwing up all over the floor…" said Robin.

***

Ever since those strangely-dressed teens came into their school, Anna had been suspicious. Deeply suspicious.

The others, being so laser-focused on surviving to the next day, probably hadn't noticed. Or if they had, they considered it less important than the fact that these strangers were on their side, for now.

But Istina couldn't quite pin them down. Most of them had none of the animal features of the Ancients, nor the halos of the Sankta, or horns of the Sarkaz. Yet, they were also too tall for Durin. She'd come across Durin before, and all of them would easily be dwarfed by the height of these supposed "fellow teenagers".

That was strange enough. But their proficiency in fighting was even stranger. Her Ursus classmates fought too, but these people _moved_ differently, almost as if... they were trained soldiers trapped in the bodies of teenagers.

Thus, Anna continually observed them from a distance, trying to figure out what made them tick.

Alas, even a bookworm like her gets impatient too. And so when those strange teens went off without a word (either to them or each other), she couldn't help but follow.

***

"Guys, I looked at a few of the books in their little school library." said Robin

"… And?"

"Batman made me memorise trivia from a wide variety of disciplines, because there were cases he worked on where knowledge of obscure stuff like history or literature were key to tracking down the suspect. I can state facts on most subjects today, from physics to the history of world music.

And yet, I recognise almost none of the names in those books. All the countries referenced were unrecognisable to me, as are all the cities, important figures, and historical events like wars and plagues. None of the books, movies, or paintings ring a bell. Plus, they write about magic like it's well-known and widely-used. The only things I could recognise were several bits of technology, and the _cuisines,_ weirdly enough."

" _Wooow,_ This must be some really out-of-the-way town then, if the books are that strange to you. Or maybe you just can't read Russian as well as you think?" Wally said.

" _KF,_ I'm being serious here. You're the Team clown, but you also get straight B's on all your Math and Science classes, and the only reason you don't get A's is because your Speed Force-induced ADHD keeps you from paying attention for more than five seconds at a time. But I know if you can apply that noggin of yours, you can see why a school library in a big city with almost _nothing_ recognisable in them is such a goddamn big deal."

"… Oh geez, don't tell me… "

"Yes KF, we're in another world, it seems."

" _What!?_ I thought we travelled to the far future or something…"

"... Possible, but given the dearth of connections to our world, assuming we're on another world entirely is our safest bet."

"... Okay. Cool."

"Wally!"

" _What?_ We'll get back, it's okay. I mean, Flash told me all about the times the Justice League-"

" _Yes,_ we're aware of your point, Wally. Personally, though, I wouldn't find it too much of a comfort if we find a way back by the time we're of old age." Kal'dur said, in a rare moment of candidness.

"... Personally, I don't mind if I never saw some of my folks again." Artemis deadpanned. "But that leaves us with this: _What do we do now?_ "

"If only we had the bioship with us… It'd make this situation so much easier..." said M'gann.

"Yeah, well, tough luck, eh?"

"Being a warrior... being a _Hero_ means adapting to ever-changing circumstances." said Aqualad. "Now that we've lost our bioship, and any access to allies from our world, we'll have to learn how to make do without them. We have no other choice."

"We _will,_ because we were trained by the best."

"Not all of us…"

" _Not helping,_ Superboy."

"… Sorry."

"… Guys, wait." Robin said, holding up a hand for the rest of the Team to hold their silence.

Approaching the door of the classroom, Robin suddenly jerked it open. It swung inwards, causing a certain blue-haired bear girl to fall face-first inside into the room. She quickly stood up and brushed off her blouse, as if she didn't just face-plant in front of the whole Team.

"So… How much did you hear?" asked Robin, more teasingly than worryingly.

"Some… but not enough. Is it true that you people are from another world?"

"... I _knew_ we should've stuck with telepathic chat." Artemis said. Robin shushed her.

"Does it really matter?" M'gann asked.

" _Yes._ " Anna replied, her tongue sharp. "People tend to be afraid of those they don't fully understand. And while I'm all for regulating one's instincts as the next civilized person, in this case I am more inclined to trust it. _I don't trust you,_ and the more I know about you people, the better I can protect my friends."

"Are we really that threatening to you?" asked M'gann.

_M'gann, just come clean. All this dancing around is making me nauseous._ Superboy said over the telepathic line.

M'gann paused, and shot a look at the others.

_Well, there's no point in hiding it, is there?_

_Nope._

_Probably not._

_We're already pretty goddamn strange to them. We have no fancy animal ears on our heads, as seems to be the norm around here. I think it's just better to come clean with them now, rather than having to keep up a tangle of lies that'll keep getting_ more _tangled the longer it lasts._

… _Well, good enough for me._

After a few moments, Robin finished formulating his response:

" _Okay,_ to put a very long and complicated answer short: You're right. We currently believe this world isn't _our_ world."

Anna took several seconds to process this.

"So what you're saying is… There are other worlds than Terra, you just happened to _stumble in_ from another, and now you're looking for a way back?"

" _Hey,_ it happens all the time." said Wally. "I heard _all sorts_ of stories from other heroes, about times they got sucked into a portal and ended up on another planet or universe, and had to make do until they found a way back home. I remember this one guy in Japan-"

" _KF,_ now is _not_ the time."

"Geez, sorry. Anyway, it's alright if you have trouble believing us-"

"I believe you. There would be no reason for you to make it all up."

"... Really?"

"Yes."

Sensing the awkwardness, Ms. Martian quickly redirected the conversation to more fruitful ends

"So, err, _Terra,_ right? Is that what you call your world?" she asked.

"Seems pretty generic, if ya ask me."

" _Wally._ "

" _Alright, alright_ , sorry."

Kal'dur strode up to the Ursus girl.

"Ms. Anna, I know we may seem strange and untrustworthy to you, but in actuality, _we need_ your help more than you need ours. Being from another world, we have lost access to our homes and everybody we know. We only have each other now. So please, as one of the first people who have helped us in this world, please lend us your aid one more time:

Tell us as much about your world as you know. Do not leave anything out. Your nations, your peoples, your ways of living... Every single bit could help."

We have access to the contents of this school's library, but an explanation from a local of this world would still be best. Such a person would be able to give appropriate context and answer any uncertainties we foreigners might have."

"... _Alright,_ I guess I could humour you." she said. "But bear in mind, you would be better off asking an expert about these sorts of stuff… I read a lot of books, but I don't consider myself an expert on anything, even Arts."

"We _know,_ but in this situation, we have no better options."

"How flattering… Ah, and it's Ms. Morozova. That's my real last name. Call me Anna or Ms. Morozova, but not Ms. Anna please. It sounds a bit juvenile to me..."

Robin, Wally, and Artemis just looked at each other.

***

"They're still breathing. Holy crap. I mean, they show all the signs of having been recently electrocuted, yet they're not dead, just unconscious..." said the Ops team's medic, as she examined the pulses of the Reunion troops trapped inside the net. They found them in the middle of a street, an incongruous sight in a place where corpses and Originum were more common than living things.

When they rounded a corner, they came across another pair of Reunion thugs, also knocked unconscious and tied up in the middle of the street.

"Now _this_ is _damn strange._ Anyone with enough strength to concuss them like this should've had enough strength to just kill them. Instead, whoever did this clearly exerted a great amount of control to preserve their lives…" said the medic, examining the bumps on their heads.

" _Geez,_ It's like something out of some old-timey comic book or something…" said another Operator, carelessly scratching his head. "I didn't think there'd be people who bothered to do it in real life..."

"Well, whoever it was, the trail of tied-up Reunion goons ends here." Blaze said, pointing to a stocky building that was almost certainly a school. "There's gotta be _something_ interesting in there. _Everyone,_ make yourselves _presentable!_ We're gonna have a little _school visit._ "


	3. Unexpected Retrieval

It was late at night. Wally was dead asleep in his bedroll, his skin burning up and slick with sweat. Here and there, he would fearfully mumble nonsense.

How is he doing, Artemis?" Kal'dur asked, his tone softer than usual.

It's… weird." the archer opined. "He just said that he felt like going to bed early tonight, and then the moment he hit the pillow, he was like… this!"

Getting hurt (or even worse) was nothing new in the Heroing community. It was a risk that was obvious to anyone with more than two brain cells to rub together. After all, while Heroes might be bound by an oath of minimal force, villains and invaders of humanity have no such compunctions. Many heroes over the age of ten knew one or two fellow heroes who've since fallen in the field.

But it wasn't often dwelt upon. Not when children deciding to don the mask was so commonplace as to be socially accepted.

"Perhaps he'd merely become infected due to that wound on his shoulder." said Aqualad.

Artemis grunted.

It was possible. Who knows what pile of garbage that brat pulled that crystal-thing from?

After a few moments, Robin looked up. "...Wait, guys… What if the crystal itself is causing this reaction?" he said. The rest of them looked among themselves.

When they approached the subject of Originium, Ms. Morozova looked rather nervous. She spoke well-enough about it's widespread use as an energy source (analogous to fossil fuels in their world). After that, though, she refused to speak any further on the matter.

The books, too, spoke of Originium as a wondrous energy source that made technological advancements on Terra possible. Paired with those words, however, were grim warnings about how dangerous the stuff was. They wrote about specialised crews "decontaminating" areas containing Originium, usually growing where it was most inconvenient. Such as, say, in land slated for development. But there was nothing about _why_ Originium was so dangerous.

There was something people didn't want to tell them, something big. This hesitancy irked Robin.

Once again, they contemplated just pulling out the damn crystal, now that they know it was supposed to be some kind of dangerous toxin. The sound of a chainsaw a few levels down, though, broke their train of thought.

Wally woke up with a shout.

***

The Rhodes Island Ops team crept through barely-lit hallways. Those with missile weapons pointed them at every angle conceivable. Melee operators stood between their ranged teammates, ready to cut down those who got too close for comfort. The team's medic walked at the group's centre. They moved in teams of two, always within shouting distance of one another.

One of those pairs noticed an unblocked door. They signalled to the others that they were venturing inside.

They entered, and an entire classroom of screaming students descended upon them with knives and hammers.

" _Holy fuck,_ there are _children_ here!" said one of the pair.

And soon as he said that, a rusty knife pierced his stomach. He gurgled and collapsed to the floor.

His buddy backpedaled wildly, firing bolts at the charging crowd. He kept firing, even as he saw his friend's corpse getting butchered like the carcass of a game animal.

He took down one, two, three, before one child got close enough to cut his shins with a fruit knife. He turned around and ran like hell.

" _Guuuys, help!_ "

He ran behind Blaze, whose hand reached for her chainsaw.

She lifted the thing out of its case, raised it into the sky, and revved it up.

* _BBBRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR_ *

The whirring sound of the moving saw reverberated throughout the entire hallway. Facing the crowd, the Feline took on the scariest face she could muster.

"So you wanna take me _on,_ brats!?"

The children hesitated, their weapons going slack in their hands. Some form of sanity returned to them, even if only out of naked self-preservation.

"..."

Then, the other side of the hallway collapsed in a sea of dust. A hatted, white-haired figure stepped through. Skadi.

Most of the children noticed the white-haired Aegir, and decided to rush her instead.

Blaze dropped her scary face, and yelled.

" _Skadi,_ they're just _kids,_ don't _hurt_ 'em!"

Skadi paused, and looked at the children now charging at her with fruit knives and letter openers.

"..."

She opened her mouth, and the ocean flowed out.

" _Younglings, you are all being very foolish,_

_Believing yourselves the bigger predator._

_Bless the Gods that watch over you,_

_That I am in no mood for death this day._ "

Instead of pulling out her sword, she swatted aside the first child that reached her with the back of her hand. The second child reached her, and tried to sink a knife into her guts. The blade broke into two. Skadi knocked the child away with a metre rule she picked up from somewhere.

The child flew into a shelf of cubby holes, leaving her dazed in a pile of splintered wood.

Skadi then knocked away another child, then another, then another. She batted children left and right like an old-fashioned schoolmarm.

" _Ahh! Monsters!_ There are monsters all around us!" the rest of them yelled. They ran in all directions, anywhere other than the two women bracketing the ends of the hallway.

Meanwhile, a noble girl was creeping behind Blaze with a knife, ready to shank her, when a pair of arms behind _her_ choked her out by surprise. The thump of an unconscious body falling to the floor made Blaze turn around. She cocked an eyebrow at the strangely-dressed boy before her.

"Y'know, I could've handled her myself." she said. "And you are… ?"

"Just call me _Robin,_ your friendly neighborhood Boy Wonder!" he said, backhanding yet another charging noble.

"... Uh huh, you definitely don't look like a local. Can I ask _what the hell's going on here?_ These children were attacking my people like a pack of wild animals! Has this whole place gone _completely insane?_ "

This "Robin" character rubbed his hands behind his head.

" _Weeell…_ It's a long story, see…"

***

" _Aww c'mon,_ I was never _actually_ gonna use it on those kids. What do you think I am, some kind of psychopath?"

When everyone woke up to the sound of chainsaws whirring, it was that _Aqualad_ guy and his strange band who volunteered to investigate.

They left before Zima could even give them the okay, which irked her something fierce. Weren't they supposed to be part of the group? _Did_ they consider themselves part of the group? Even after helping them cook, scavenge, and fight off those noble bastards, apparently not.

The Self-Government group expected all sorts of things to happen to them downstairs. Gummy worried for them. Some thought that Reunion had finally started going for them, and urged the rest to flee the school while they still can. As if that didn't entail running _into_ Reunion territory. A few fantasised about those strangers getting killed in their place, so they didn't have to deal with those moralising worms anymore.

Zima didn't particularly think much of anything. She just sat up in her bedroll, and waited.

They returned.

Gummy gasped. "It's new people!"

Meanwhile, Zima was doing her utmost best not to start smashing windows at the sight of _even more_ strangers from outside.

" _Blyat,_ did Peterheim secretly transform into a lighthouse or something? Why do idiots keep wandering inside this place." Zima said, holding a hand to her head. "Anyway, Lada, don't cook anything for them."

"H-Huh? But Sonia-"

" _No buts._ Our food stores are running out. Very soon, we'll have to eat our own arms and legs if we keep holding out our hand to more strangers."

" _Nah,_ that won't be necessary…" said the woman at the head of this new batch of strangers, an intimidatingly-built Feline woman. "Because all of you children are _coming along_ with us back to Rhodes Island."

" _Ms. Blaze,_ what about the energy readings?" said one of them.

" _Screw_ the energy readings, it's probably nothing anyways. This, children _starving_ and going all _Lord of the Flies_ to survive, is the real priority here! I'm no bleeding-heart, but I'll take saving kids over investigating some strange anomaly. _My orders._ If any of you worry about getting heat from Doc Kal about it, just say that it was all from me. I'm supposed to be Team Leader for this operation anyways…" Blaze said.

"Err… Rhodes Island?" rasped Wally.

"Some kind of medicine company or another, I wasn't really paying attention." said Artemis.

"And why the _hell_ should we trust you!?" Zima roared.

One of the newcomers stepped forward. A person with a halo like that of an angel, and wearing the garb of a field medic, approached Zima with her hands raised.

"... You shouldn't feel obligated to trust us. But we _are_ one of the only organisations in Terra with expertise in caring for Originium-caused diseases and medical complications. Even if you don't want to trust us, at least think about your friend over there." she said, gesturing vaguely at Wally's direction.

"... He's not my friend…" said Zima, half-heartedly.

"At the moment, though, Robin and Aqualad looked at each other, and they nodded in unison.

They turned to Wally.

Wally shrugged. "Hey, it's not like we have any better options, right?"

Aqualad turned to the representative.

"Give us a few minutes to gather everyone of us here. We're leaving with you." said the Atlantean

"... So _that's it,_ then? You're leaving us behind?" asked Zima.

Robin turned towards the Ursus girl.

" _You're right,_ "General" Sonia, we can't save everyone. The least we can do right now is save those who need it the most. In this case, it's our _teammate_ who needs it the most, not some self-styled leader too _stubborn_ to accept help when it comes knocking on her classroom door!"

Zima grunted. She looked away, then back again. She gritted her teeth.

She locked eyes with Anna, and then with Lada (Gummy's real name). Lada gave her a sad smile. In her hands Zima saw her red frying pan, dented yet clean and well-kept, even in this hellhole.

She looked at the junk Gummy carried in her pack, all those various knick knacks she put to use _somehow._ She looked at the great vault door she picked up from somewhere, for self-defense. The Ursus Scout motto came to Zima's mind (what little she could remember from overhearing their after-school practice, at least). To _never let anything go to waste,_ to _always be prepared,_ to _never leave anything or anyone behind._

From the back of the group, someone pushed their way forward. The others parted, and the rest saw.

"... U-Umm, _Miss?_ S-Something happened to Mia…"

Zima turned to the voice. It was a boy, one of the small gaggle of survivors that made up their little group. He was helping a fellow classmate walk.

Zima could see the crystal lesions on her neck.

She clenched her fists so hard, the veins turned white.

***

All the students were outside now, looking back at Peterheim, their home for the last few weeks (miserable though it was).

As the students turned away from the school, a voice cried out from the rubble.

"Wait!"

Everyone turned, to see a girl stagger out of the ruined building. She was Ursus like them, tall and with hair as white as snow. She wore what was once a preppy school uniform, that had since been reduced to a state little better than rags and animal skin. Her hair was unkempt, and her eyes were wide and pleading.

"P-Please… Let me go with you too…"

Zima looked at her for a few seconds, then glared at her hatefully.

"You…" she said, and the tone made the white-haired girl flinch. "You were with those _fucking_ noble kids!"

For a breathless while, nobody spoke.

"... Yes, yes, I won't deny it… I won't- I won't deny that it happened…" she said, falling to her knees before Zima's stare.

Zima slowly reached behind her, and pulled out her massive woodcutter's axe.

She swung it back, then swung forward as if to behead her.

She slowed mid-swing, such that the blade barely nicked her skin. Blood trickled out of her neck. Her face twitched in pain, but also surprise.

"You _bitch,_ do you know just how fuckin' _many_ of us your merry little band _killed!?_ Did you even know their _names!?_ _Alexei, Anya, Lora, Nadie…_ I bet you won't know who the fuck I'm talking about, but _their blood_ is on _your hands..._ and I'm collecting the debt personally."

She reared back her arms, axe-in-hand, readying the final blow. The noble girl continued to kneel, not moving, not responding.

Blaze and Robin moved to intercept, but Gummy rushed past all of them.

She caught Zima's axe arm before it could swing the final blow. Zima grit her teeth as she tried to wrench out of Gummy's grip, but they were surprisingly even in strength.

" _Sonia,_ s-stop! There's no point in killing her anymore!" the chef girl said.

" _Let go,_ stupid Gummy! Didn't you _see_ what they did!? What _she,_ the responsible student council president, _allowed_ them to do!? Did you remember all of our classmates that her people butchered like _animals?_ Let me _fucking_ go so I can even the scales right _fucking_ now!"

" _No_ Zima… I'm sick of death… I'm sick of people dying around me… _No more deaths_ Sonia! _No more!_ We're leaving all that behind in Peterheim now! _Please,_ Sonia..."

She looked at her group's chef, at her friend. The sole cheerful light in their miserable group. Zima then looked back at the noble girl. She was in utter ruins. Her clothes were more fit to be burned than washed. She looked down at the dirt. She kept kneeling, awaiting death like a saint.

… _Well fuck that._

Dropping her axe, Zima instead grabbed the chin of the noble girl, forcing her to look eye-to-eye.

She then punched her in the face.

The punch sent her sprawling all over the rubble, a stream of blood rushing from her nose.

"Fine, I'll let your maggoty ass follow us. But you keep your mouth _shut,_ noble. You _try anything,_ and I will _gut_ you like a _fish._ "

The noble girl nodded tersely, as she stood up.


	4. A Single Life

At that moment, Wally felt like hell.

"Can you walk?" he heard a far-off voice say.

"Y-Yeah, I guess…" he replied.

"... Just keep your eyes to the front and follow me, alright?"

"Sure thing, Doc." he said. And he was pretty sure she was a Doc, from the way she talked. It seemed very Doctor-y, if Wally had to describe it.

"...You know, we still have a stretcher to spare, if you're _really_ not up for walking…" said one of the other Rhodes Island people.

It took a heroic effort of equilibrioception to walk another few steps, but walk them Wally did. Even with one arm bound in bandages, he could still balance with the other-

" _Oof!_ "

He fell into the arms of another Operator.

"Alright, you need the stretcher…" he could hear, somewhat hazily, from behind him, or beside him, he couldn't tell.

Before the boy who called himself Kid Flash could reply, two Operators carried him into the stretcher.

***

 _This mission is pretty much toast,_ thought Blaze.

First off, they completely failed to find the source of these "strange energy readings" that the eggheads were going on about. 

Secondly, one of their guys was dead. 

Finally, they now had to babysit an entire gaggle of schoolchildren like they were teachers taking a field trip to Kazdel or some shit.

Not to say that she regretted rescuing those kids. If she were stuck in some time loop that made her do this mission all over again, she'd choose to do it again in a heartbeat.

… Well, everyone except _those_ students.

When she found out what had happened to Operator Steven during the attack, his corpse hacked apart for meat like a farm animal, she went _livid._ She wanted to pull those cannibalistic fucks out of their little hidey-holes and introduce them to her chainsaw _for real_ this time.

She would have. She could have. She very nearly did.

But still… they were _kids._ Kids locked in one place, slowly starving, having had to survive without adults for _weeks._ At what point does it become fair to blame hungry children for doing what they think they needed to do to survive?

… Plus, if she did set out to do that, she had no doubt that some nosy people would inevitably trace the carnage back to her, and by extension Rhodes Island. And Rhodes Island did not need another black spot on it's PR.

...

Fuck, this was all too much. She _hated_ it when things were all ambiguous and complicated like this. She felt much better when she knew where all the bad guys were. Then, she could tear fools apart with her chainsaw without hesitation.

… And then there were those children, clearly not students, and definitely not Ursus.

They were… strange. Which was saying quite a bit, considering the staff Rhodes Island tended to hire. But these boys and girls were a _different_ kind of strange.

For one thing, they were unusually well-trained for their age. Their bearing and training, along with their age, just screamed "child soldier" to Blaze. At times, they almost reminded her of Frostleaf and her ilk.

But while child soldiers were (unfortunately) not unseen in Terra, that's not what was bothering her at the moment. What she couldn't figure out, was why a bunch of them would be _here_ in Chernobog, of all places.

Reunion may still be running around, but this wasn't an active warzone anymore. The army and police had since fled with their tails in the air.

She _might_ believe that the Ursus Government had a change of heart and tried to retake the city. But knowing them, they would sooner do it with their own people, than stoop to hiring mercs (at least, not yet ).

They also didn't seem like Reunion… wait, _were_ they Reunion!? One of them was definitely infected.

But if they were, they were unusually noble Reunion goons, who just so happened to not wear their colours at all…

Nope, they're definitely not Reunion.

And _none_ of them were native Ursus. One or two non-Ursus, fine, but _none?_ In a country that was about _eighty-percent_ ethnic Ursus? Blaze didn't believe it.

Not to mention, she couldn't even properly _tell_ their races just by looking at them.

One of them was clearly Aegir, judging from the gills. The green girl might be some weird subspecies of Savra she's never seen. The rest were a bust, though. They had no Ancient features. At all. No Sankta features, either, or Sarkaz. They're not short like the Durin, and none of them have pointed ears. As far as race was concerned, they're as featureless as one can get without also being bald.

Most of them also wore these weird circus-y outfits, not anything a modern teenager would wear.

They're _damn strange,_ was all that Blaze could come up with, and she was keeping an eye on them. At least, until the Docs looked them over and decided what to do with them.

***

The white-haired girl walked among the Rhodes Islanders in front, ahead of the students. The Operators didn't want to risk her getting killed by them, not after that… incident a few minutes earlier. A few of the students sent hateful glares her way. Some of them clearly believed that Zima should've just gone through with it.

All around them, a perimeter of Operators were looking in all directions.

Someone started walking beside her. Who would…

It was the blonde one. Of course. The one who stopped her from getting killed by that… justifiably vengeful student. She bet the rest of them didn't like her very much for that, which would explain why she's even bothering to talk to a villain like her. She has yet to thank her for saving her life.

She wondered if anything she could give could repay that.

She wondered if she _should_ have been saved.

" _Hi!_ My name's Lada, but you can call me _Gummy,_ everybody does! It's because I love sweets that much, I guess. What's _your_ name?" the girl said to her, cheerfully, as if the last few weeks hadn't happened at all.

"…"

She wondered if it would be safe to give out her name like this. She then realised, it was a silly concern.

"Natalya…"

"That's a _pretty_ name." Gummy replied, clasping Natalya's hands in her own.

Natalya blinked.

***

Before they set off, Aqualad made each of the Team do a little demonstration in front of the Rhodes Island people. They wanted to prove that they deserved to be among the ones protecting the students, instead of the ones being protected.

For Superboy, he started off by grabbing a piece of concrete debris larger than his fist, and crushed it into powder with nothing but his bare hands.

They still weren't convinced

Then, he lifted an abandoned car that he was pretty sure wouldn't be used anymore, and threw it all the way to the other end of the street. It flew about a dozen blocks or so.

Reluctantly, they allowed the Team to stand guard alongside them, so long as they followed Ms. Blaze's orders. They were " _Impromptu, Temporary Pseudo-Operators_ " (or so one of them put it).

It rankled Connor a bit, that they treated him as just one step above a helpless civilian, even if he could understand. After all, it was a whole new world. Of course no one would understand what the "S" symbol on his shirt meant.

It was... almost kind of refreshing, actually. It meant that this symbol could be _his,_ instead of some asshole whom everyone somehow loves, but looked at him like an eyesore for even bothering to _exist._

…

 _Screw this._ He wanted to smack some bad guys in the face.

***

Of course, it would be naive to think they would be able to get out without Reunion attempting a bit of resistance.

"Three on our six!"

They were quickly dispatched by Superboy smacking their heads together like acorns.

" Five more on our left!"

" _Hell Yeahhh!!!_ "

Blaze let out a whopping cry, as she tore through four goons with two deft swings of her massive chainsaw. Blood flew everywhere. She bathed in it. The blood bubbled and steamed as it touched her.

Skadi was casually batting Reunion troops into the air, mostly with the flat of her blade, as if they weren't worth chipping the edge of her sword over.

Robin winced as he saw the Feline woman dismember her enemies with her moving saw.

" _Holy shit…_ " said Artemis." They're _really hardcore._ Betcha lucky stars we didn't pick a fight with them, eh?"

" _Artemis._ We shouldn't be revelling in this sort of violence." said Aqualad.

Conner was silent as he looked at the two women causing mass devastation: Blaze's manic expression as she brutalised her way through a huge swath of the enemy forces, and Skadi's... Skadiness.

"... _Meh,_ I could take them." he said

Meanwhile, Wally was trying to convince the medic that he could still fight. Totally. Really. While they still carried him in a stretcher.

"We know you can fight. Your teammates have told us that much, and they strike me as genuine people. But right now, you're in no shape to fight. Even our most elite and experienced Operators have had to take time out from the field after having sustained serious injuries. Believe me, you can't just will those things away with sheer force of will." said the medic.

Wally had no response against that sensical argument, and he was spent anyways, so he just fell back into the stretcher.

"..."

He idly looked to the side, and saw a burning building a few blocks away. His eyes widened.

" _Wait,_ I think there are people trapped on the balcony there!" yelled Wally.

He could see the Ursus girl's form, even ten floors up, as she was silhouetted against the raging flames behind her. She couldn't be any older than ten, and she was trying to get as far away from the fire as possible. But she was on a balcony, and the only way to go further was down.

She looked down, but all she could see was bare concrete, and Reunion members looking up at her.

Wally desperately looked around, despite his mental haze. M'gann, the only one of their group with any flight capability _,_ was tied down by an enemy. Literally. One of them encased her in a red ribbon that somehow reduced her to kneeling on the ground, blocked of her psychic abilities.

It was probably Magic.

Magic, though useful, was bullshit.

Everyone else… was _way_ too busy keeping off the hordes coming in from all directions. The enemy goons were coming within a metre or so from the children, before they got shot or beaten into the ground. They were barely holding out as it was.

No other choice. Only he could do it.

Damn his body.

"She's _dead._ There's no point in going back for her now! The only way out is forward!" said a nearby Operator.

"No! I _refuse_ to believe that!" said Wally, standing up straight. "So far, I've only been walking like a snail this whole time. Now, the rest of you people can see... why they call me _Kid Flash!_ "

" _Wait,_ kid, what are you-"

He leapt out of the stretcher, and disappeared in a yellow blur.

" _Everyone,_ cover Kid Flash!" yelled Aqualad. Nearly at once, the Team's ranged attacks flew in the direction of that distant building. Arrows, smoke bombs, and jets of pressurised water came hurtling at the gathered Reunion troops. Those that weren't knocked out, had to dive out of the way of the barrage.

Wally then sped right past battered Reunion troops, leaving behind a trail of dust large enough to send them coughing and sputtering in his wake.

And all the while, his right arm _screamed,_ like a million pins had started travelling down his arm from the crystal embedded in his shoulder.

Wally bit his tongue, and kept on running

He ran, ran, _ran._ His running built up enough momentum to overpower gravity, and he ran up the side of the burning building.

He leapt onto the tenth-storey balcony, landed on the railing with a wince, and held out his hand.

The girl flinched and drew back, afraid of this costumed young man who had done the impossible, just to get to her.

"... Hey, c'mon, don't be afraid... I'm here to _help you._ "

Nervously, the girl looked towards her left. The building's interior held a cornucopia of raging flames, like it was the mouth to hell itself.

She glanced right, at the balcony's flimsy-looking railing, the only thing standing between her and a messy death on the asphalt below.

She looked forward, at the yellow-suited stranger.

She leapt into Wally's arm. Singular, given as his right arm was out of operation. He made do by hoisting her over his left shoulder.

"Close your eyes and hold on tight, kid, we're _gonna go faaast._ "

He willed his legs to move on, despite the sharp spikes of pain now coursing through his legs with every muscle contraction.

He ran back down the side of the burning building, then all the way back to the group. All the while, the girl gripped his shoulder.

The yellow blur went to the medic and handed her the child, before collapsing to the ground.

"I-Is she alright!? Are _you_ alright!?" said the medic, rapidly doing a checkup on the crying girl.

"My power cancels out inertia for anybody I'm holding. So she should be fine." he said, lying down in the dirt.

"Oh _Great Savior of us all…_ She's alright..." the medic said, making the sign of the cross.

_Wait, do Earth religions also exist here?_

Meanwhile, a particularly large horde of Reunion goons was running straight at them.

"Quick! Everyone in the building!" Blaze yelled, pointing to a squat apartment block right behind them. She put herself between everyone and the rushing Reunion troops, and readied her chainsaw. " _Defenders,_ to me!"

At once, men and women with shields of many makes and models, formed an idiosyncratic shield wall, with Blaze at their centre.

The first wave of Reunion crashed over them like a tidal wave of fury and scavenged weapons. Half of them got impaled by their own forward momentum, running into spears that emerged like spikes from the gaps between the shields.

" _Fuuuuuuuucck Yoooooooooouuu!!_ "

Meanwhile, Blaze was bisecting two unlucky bastards at once. They had the gall to think her easy prey, simply because she lacked a shield. But who needed a shield, when you had a huge fuck-off chainsaw that can cut two terrorists in one go.

Hot blood flew everywhere, as the chainsaw _whirred._

At any other point, at any other time, the Team might've found it disturbing. They still kind of do. For now, though, they're just glad she was on their side.


End file.
